St. Louis City SC opens up the 2023 MLS Cup Playoffs with a first-round, best-of-three Round One series against archrivals Sporting Kansas City with Game One set for CITYPARK.
St. Louis is the eighth expansion team to reach the playoffs in its first season and are seeking to become the third team to win a playoff game/series with Chicago in 1998 and Nashville in 2020 the other two.
They were the first expansion team in MLS history to win its conference in its debut season, finishing atop the West with a 17-12-5 record, 56 points, 62 goals scored and a plus-17 goal difference.
Bradley Carnell's men became the first expansion club in MLS history (excluding the shootout era) to win 17 regular season games in their inaugural season and they are the fourth first-year side to score 60 or more goals, joining Chicago (1998), LAFC (2018) and Atlanta (2019).
Their 11 home wins of the season tie Atlanta United for the most by an expansion team in their inaugural season with nine of those 11 wins coming in matches in which they scored three or more goals.
CITY SC scored 41 goals at home in the regular season, which is tied for second with Columbus and one behind Atlanta in that category.
St. Louis tallied four finalists for the 2023 MLS Year-End awards. The Carnell (Coach of the Year), captain and Roman Burki (Goalkeeper of the Year), vice-captain Tim Parker (Defender of the Year), and midfielder Eduard Lowen (Newcomer of the Year).
Kansas City finished the season strong, winning their final two regular-season matches before defeating San Jose on penalty kicks in the Western Conference Wild Card game to advance.
The winner of this match will face either fourth-seed Houston or fifth-seed Real Salt Lake, who open their series tonight in Houston, in the Western Conference semifinals.
Team news
St. Louis City SC
Rasmus Alm is the only player absent for St. Louis as the Swedish midfielder will miss out with a sports hernia.
Kortne Ford (Achilles surgery) and Kayden Pierre (hamstring) have both been ruled out while Jake Davis (knee sprain), Tim Leibold (groin), Alan Pulido (foot), Johnny Russell (groin), and Erik Thommy (calf) are all listed as questionable.
Predicted lineups
St. Louis City SC: Bürki; Markanich, Nilsson, Parker, Nerwinski; Blom, Watts; Löwen, Jackson; Gioacchini, Klauss
Sporting Kansas City: Meila; Ndenbe, Fontàs, Rosero, Davis; Thommy, Radoja, Walter; Salloi, Pulido, Russell
Ones to watch
Roman Burki (St. Louis City SC)
The Swiss shot-stopper enjoyed one of the finest seasons by a goalkeeper in league history, appearing in 33 games, finishing with 17 wins, a 78.5% save percentage, and seven clean sheets to run away with MLS Goalkeeper of the Year.
Burki is also the club captain, his play on the field and leadership off the field setting the tone for St. Louis all season.
Daniel Salloi (Sporting Kansas City)
Playing in a three-man forward line with more heralded teammates Alan Pulido and Johnny Russell, Salloi finished with seven goals and eight assists during the regular season.
He also scored the penalty kick that clinched the shootout against San Jose to send SKC to this matchup with their archrivals.
Previous meetings
The two rivals met three times this season with the home team winning all three and St. Louis taking two of those by a combined 8-1 scoreline and Kansas City a narrow 2-1 winner.
On May 21, a brace by Indiana Vassilev as well as goals by Lowen and Nicolas Gioacchini powered St. Louis to a 4-0 win in the teams' first-ever meeting.
Alan Pulido scored twice to give SKC a come-from-behind 2-1 victory in their September 2 meeting after Sam Adeniran opened the scoring for the expansion side.
In the third and final matchup, Adeniran was again on the scoresheet and Jared Stroud and a pair by Joao Klauss in a 12-minute span gave St. Louis an easy 4-1 triumph with Willy Agada tallying in stoppage time.
St. Louis became the first team to score four or more goals in multiple games against Kansas City since Dallas in 1999.
How to watch
The match will be televised nationally on Fox Sports 1 and streaming live on Apple TV + with Jake Zivin serving as the play-by-play announcer and Taylor Twellman as analyst.
Kickoff is set for 10pm Eastern time.